I am writing to challenge the thesis that smoking marijuana interferes with productivity.

[several minutes pass]

By writing I am thus proving it because I smoked pot and am now—how about it!?—producing text—interrobang! though that was over an hour ago and I have since done nothing else but take a bath and read a book. Some of a book, to parse words. Reading in the bath alone, however, is a step up for my more typical attention span at late. In another situation, dogsitting for example, I might put on a podcast and cut the whole experience to 30 minutes not bothering with the antiquated technology of a book which requires constant handling, often proving difficult in the bath.

[Now I am looking at myself in the window thinking of how best to fill these block parentheses, now I am looking at myself write this with shifty eyes as a joke only to myself, but also as a function of this writing exercise which I presently shall explain]

I am writing about a pot strain called Strawberry Banana as an experiment in the application of design thinking to improved functioning of the organization that I call myself and you may call Andrew. Essentially I will take advantage of several factors—or really, better stated, I will live in the coming totality of my life’s circumstances—not limited to the sale of marijuana legally through pot shops in Oregon, beginning October 1st.

But to those of you who may be saying, “Andrew, it is only September 29th—so how can you begin this project?” I would inquire how you know it is September 29th when I do not have access to the internet and therefore cannot connect these words with eyeballs before tomorrow, but then I would say that I am in Washington where this eventuality has already come to pass.

[At this juncture I decide to put some more clothes on, now that I am more literally dry and at the moment not possessing of a head filled with the words that come next, more metaphorically “dry,” as in ideas]

Looking back on my thesis I suppose I should clarify that I am not debunking a negative statement—Smoking pot doesn’t make productivity not happen—but saying that smoking pot incites productivity and it has become apparent to me that not only do I need to write this, and the thing that’s two years deep that it’s a part of, which is part of another thing that I’m a decade into, which is part of something that I’m three decades into which is my life, not only do I find a distinct satisfaction in seeing an interesting idea made flesh and then dead again in words on a page, but I need to do this over and over again until I die and I need to figure out how I can do that before I do.

[The office chair I am sitting in swivels which is really satisfying when I retreat into another block parenthesis]

The rest of the story I suppose will come along in the end, but I should get to the point before I shuffle off this Tuesday coil: I am going to review legal weed and write about it in regard to how much writing I do, the quality and character of it, the device on which I create it, as well as general reflections on experience.

[1st wave of revision begun and finished]

You’ll note that this weed made me so excited to get my idea down that I did not even put clothes on besides a pair of underwear before hitting the keys on the laptop. Furthermore, it gave me such a burst of confidence in the idea I was writing about that I had to put it down on the computer so that I could start a blog about reviewing weed—and that this would be the way I promoted the book I would be finishing in the next few months. Delusional thinking ensued that I would be on the front lines of a DIY marijuana review scene and that this would be the way that I finally make writing work. Like many fine sativa-heavy blends this new idea I had blended perfectly with more established ones and made me really excited about not only starting this project, but that it would tie into and even facilitate the completion of older projects. While sometimes if I get really stoned and I imagine a new halo on a set of ideas I’ve been working on I will express more physical movements—big grins, arm movements, air pumps, limb shaking—this experience was more restrained and internal reflecting a slight disassociative quality.

Pretty quickly, however, through the process of writing about the idea—what was at first a principally fun-loving premise—the tenor quickly turned to death, which is perhaps a natural tendency to evoke the gravity that I felt in this idea, but more likely is because I am experiencing the death of a close friend for the first time. I don’t mean I have a friend currently dying in my arms as I type this—though, fiction writers, that opening to your next novel is free—I mean Ernie died almost two months ago and I still utterly lack words.

But this is just the first—and boy are there ever more kinds of weed out there: what will I write next!